Two day alchoholic Ginger Beer & Lemonade

HeadlessChicken · 3 May 2011 at 15:54

This is dead easy to make and you need no specialist brewing equipment! If you are after a Crabbies type ginger beer this is not for you, this makes a ginger beer of about 2% and is meant to be served by the pitcher (with ice!) almost as a refreshing squash. This will make 2 litres in 2 days!

For the Ginger beer you will need:

80g root ginger (you can use more for bigger kick! I have used over 100g in mine)
225g sugar (I have used brewing sugar as I have loads, normal is fine)
1/2 lemon
3/4 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tbsp yeast (use what you will. I have an ale yeast for this one. Apparently even bread yeast will do...)

2 litre pop bottle
Big bowl (that easily golds 2l)
muslin (or a clean tea cloth)

1) Put 2l of water on the boil on a hob. Bash root ginger with a rolling pin till nicely crushed, add to bowl.
2) Peel lemon, making sure you get no pith. Chop zest. Add juice & zest to bowl.
3) Add sugar & cream of tartar to bowl. Pour in boiling water, mix well. Cover.
4) When water is tepid, add yeast, mix. Cover and leave for 24 hours.

I'll update this tomorrow when I get to the next bit!

The ginger beer is on the left. The lemonade is a bit of an experiment. I've done the same as ginger beer, but used the zest / juice of 4 lemons and a lime (and omitted the ginger of course).

HeadlessChicken · 3 May 2011 at 19:08

Bennie-Mac said:
I assume you dont leave it for 24hrs in the fridge by the way but rather somewhere warmer?

Just in the house. The yeast needs to be at ~20 to get going

HeadlessChicken · 4 May 2011 at 15:33

24 hours later!

1) You need another big bowl or pan. Set a sieve over it with the muslin in. Pour contents through.

2) Rinse 2l pop bottle. Put funnel in the top with the washed out muslin from before. Fill her up! Screw on top and leave somewhere warm for 24 hours.

The next bit is really important!

You are putting a liquid with live yeasts and lots of sugar into a closed bottle. The yeast will continue to work. Yeasts eat sugar, and produce alcohol and carbon dioxide (which will give the drink some carbonation).

If you fill the bottles and then forget about them for a few days they will explode, and your house will smell like ginger for ages! So follow the next bit carefully.

3) After 24 hours, check the amount of work the yeasts have been doing by depressing the bottle's side. It should be quite tight. If still no pressure, leave longer. If tight, put in fridge and consume asap. If ridiculously tight, open top a smidgen to release a little CO2.

4) The cold will slow down the yeast but not stop it. So if you don't drink it immediately keep an eye on it! Best drunk within a day or two (mine never lasts a few hours with my mates!).

I'll post up some pics soon with the finished product in a glass!

HeadlessChicken · 4 May 2011 at 15:52

AcidHell2 said:
Looks great and easy. If you wanted to can't you get some stuff that kills yeast meaning you could keep it longer and let the dead yeast settle out.

Yup for sure. Potassium sorbate is the stuff. Just means you will have still ginger beer / lemonade, which certainly isn't a prob. I was just going for the quickest and less fuss method

HeadlessChicken · 5 May 2011 at 14:51

Ginger beer:

Lemonade pic coming when I have finished this

HeadlessChicken · 5 May 2011 at 15:12

AcidHell2 said:
God that looks refreshing, especially with this humid heat.

It's great. The first taste is almost lemon squash like, then straight after you get a big hit of ginger

All gone now, off to try the lemonade.

HeadlessChicken · 5 May 2011 at 15:26

Lemonade:

This is lovely. Interesting because it's very bitter, which I like. Will deffo make again

HeadlessChicken · 5 May 2011 at 16:55

dekez said:
I saw this on river cottage a little while ago, wanted to give it a go but I don't have brewers yeast or the sterilisation stuff. Where can you get these from?

No real need for sterilisation stuff for this, it's not sat anywhere long enough to breed nasties!

As for the yeast, Wilkos if you have a local one, brewing shop obviously, even some garden centres.

HeadlessChicken · 5 May 2011 at 17:22

dekez said:
Excellent, I have a Wilkos not to far from me I shall pick some up, should be ready just in time for the weekend as well

If you like ginger, I'd recommending using more than in the recipe above, and even contemplate a little dried ginger to give it some real kick

Good luck with it!

liamgo said:
looks very interesting will definitely give this a go.

might also be worth looking on youtube on how to make an airlock from the existing bottle top... much more safer and hygienic that way and you should also be able to let it ferment longer and give a give a higher alcohol content.

I have a full set of brewing equipment to hand. Fermentation vessels, demijohns, air locks, steriliser etc etc.

The whole point of this recipe is that it needs none of them, so is more available to everyone. Sure you could brew a proper ginger beer in a demijohn over a few weeks and make it 5%, rack it, prime it and bottle properly. But this is a nice 2 day recipe with no equipment needed

HeadlessChicken · 7 May 2011 at 21:15

sparkey196 said:
I'm having a party on Friday and was thinking of making a massive bucket of ginger beer to get things moving.

I'm wondering if, as a newb who was never brewed anything, if this is too ambitious? Will i be able to get the alcohol content up sufficiently in 6 days (I want it as strong as possible) and will it be fizzy if served straight from a bucket?

If you strain it, then just bung it in a bucket for a few days, it'll probably get to 4ish % (at a guess). Poss 5.

There will be no carbonation (the constrained nature of a pop bottle means that when the CO2 gets too much for the bottle it is forced into the liquid, hence bubbles), but it'll still be more than drinkable.